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I normally avoid the diplomatic circuit, as the few non-committal comments and soggy appetizers I get aren?t worth the investment of time. But I jumped at the chance to celebrate the 62nd anniversary of the founding of the People?s Republic of China with San Francisco consul general Gao Zhansheng. Happy Birthday China! When I casually

I am sitting at my MacBook Pro typing this piece in the corner Suite on the sixth floor of the Hotel Adlon in Berlin. A half finished bottle of 2001 Chateau Pech sits on my desk, a product of the French Mediterranean coast. Out the window hundreds of tourists are milling about the imposing Brandenburg

I was greatly saddened when I had learned of the passing of Senator Daniel Inoue of Hawaii, the Senate?s longest serving member, and a close friend. After 50 years last August the legislative body had come to dominate the all powerful Ways and Means Committee, eventually becoming the President Pro Tem. He was 88 when

Travel guru, Arthur Frommer, says that now is the best time to travel in 20 years, thanks to a combination of a strong dollar and desperate price-cutting forced by the recession. Five years after oil hit an historic peak at $148/barrel, when $500 fuel surcharges abounded, and the demise of the travel industry was widely

?I have to admit that it was with some trepidation that I joined Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor, for lunch in San Francisco. I have friends in the New York federal prosecutor?s office who warned me that she was tough as nails and a complete bitch, first as a prosecutor herself, and later as a

Taking the express train from Paris to Frankfurt, I was playing around with Google Maps on my iPhone 5s. It was really cool watching the blue dot marking my location zip across the map at 200 miles per hour. When I zoomed in on my location, I realized that I recognized many of the names.